Tafsir of Saba' 34:3-4

"And those who disbelieve say: 'The Hour will not come to us.'" This is a negation of the Resurrection and a denial of the coming of the Hour. Alternatively, it expresses a mocking and sarcastic impatience regarding the promise of its occurrence, similar to their saying: "When will this promise be?" (Yunus: 48; Al-Anbiya: 38).

"Say: 'Yes, by my Lord, it will surely come to you...'" The negation is followed by balā (Yes/Nay), implying: "The matter is nothing other than its coming." Then, the affirmation is repeated with the utmost emphasis and intensity: an oath by Allah, the Almighty. This oath is further strengthened by the attributes ascribed to the One by whom the oath is sworn, leading to the words: "that He may recompense." The greatness of the One by whom the oath is sworn signifies the strength and absolute certainty of the matter being sworn upon. It serves as a testimony; the higher the status of the witness, the stronger and more established the testimony.

If you ask: Does the description used for the One by whom the oath is sworn have a specific relevance to this meaning? I say: Yes. The occurrence of the Hour is among the most famous of the Unseen and the most deeply hidden. When one hears "Knower of the Unseen," the heart immediately turns to the hidden. By swearing by His name to prove the Hour’s occurrence, and then describing Him with attributes pertaining to the knowledge of the Unseen—that nothing hidden escapes His knowledge, including the timing of the Hour—the relevance becomes perfectly clear.

If you ask: People have denied and rejected the coming of the Hour. Even if He swears to them with the most solemn oaths, how can the oath of one whom they believe to be a liar against Allah validate what they have denied? I say: This would be true if He had relied solely on the oath without following it with the decisive, clear, and brilliant argument: "that He may recompense." Allah has placed in human intellects and ingrained in their nature the necessity of recompense: that the doer of good must be rewarded, and the doer of evil must be punished.

"That He may recompense" is connected to "It will surely come to you" as its justification.

• "It will surely come to you" (la-ta'tiyannakum): Read with both tā' (feminine) and yā' (masculine). The reading with yā' refers to the Hour (as a day) or attributes the action to the "Knower of the Unseen," meaning: "His command will surely come to you," as in: "Do they wait until the angels come to them, or your Lord comes?" (Al-An’am: 158) and "Or the command of your Lord comes" (An-Nahl: 33).
• "Knower of the Unseen" (‘ālim al-ghayb): Read in the genitive (al-ghaybi) as an adjective for "my Lord." Read in the nominative (al-ghaybu) as a laudatory description.
• "Escapes" (ya’zubu): Read with both damma and kasra on the zā', from al-‘uzūb, meaning distance. It is said: "A remote pasture" (rawḍ ‘azīb), meaning far from people.
• "Weight of an atom" (mithqāl dharratin): The weight of the smallest ant.
• "That" (dhālika): A reference to the weight of an atom.
• "Nor smaller than that, nor larger": Read in the nominative (aṣgharu... akbaru) based on the principle of the subject (ibtida'). Read in the accusative (aṣghara... akbara) as a negation of the genus, like saying: "There is no power and no strength except by Allah" (in both nominative and accusative). This is a statement disconnected from what precedes it.

If you ask: Is it correct to coordinate the nominative with "weight of an atom," as if to say: "Not an atom's weight, nor anything smaller, nor larger escapes Him," not for the sake of emphasizing the negation? And is the accusative coordinated with "atom" as an accusative in the place of a genitive due to the impossibility of declension (tanwīn), as if to say: "Not an atom's weight, nor the weight of anything smaller or larger escapes Him"? I say: The particle of exception (illā) forbids this, unless you consider the pronoun in "from Him" (‘anhu) to refer to the Unseen, and consider "the Unseen" to be a name for hidden things before they are written on the Preserved Tablet. For their inscription on the Tablet is an emergence from behind the veil, meaning that nothing is separated from the Unseen, and nothing is removed from Him except that it is recorded on the Tablet.

"And those who strive against Our verses, seeking to cause failure—for them will be a punishment of painful torment."